State Sen. Abel Maldonado’s drive toward confirmation, which got hung up by Assembly Democrats on Thursday and reset for another 90 days by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Friday, hasn’t helped him land a lot of contributions to his campaign for that office.

After Schwarzenegger nominated him in late November to fill the rest of former Lt. Gov. John Garamendi’s term, Maldonado, R-Santa Maria, announced his intent to seek election to a full term of his own in June’s GOP primary and November’s general election. Of course, now that the governor has withdrawn and re-submitted his nomination, it seems he’ll have to simultaneously convince the Assembly to support him and convince the public to vote for him in the primary.

“Abel Maldonado for Lt. Governor 2010” qualified as a committee Jan. 19, according to records filed with the Secretary of State’s office, even as Maldonado and Schwarzenegger were starting to ramp up public awareness and pressure on the Legislature in advance of this week’s votes. Yet the committee has received only three major contributions totaling $23,400 so far: $6,500 from Michael Fox of M.E. Fox & Co. Inc. in San Jose on Jan. 19; $11,900 from the California Professional Firefighters PAC on Feb. 1; and $5,000 from former Assemblyman and former Santa Barbara County Supervisor Brooks Firestone of Solvang on Feb. 1.

The money is bigger on the other side of the aisle. Democratic primary candidate state Sen. Dean Florez, D-Shafter, reported $957,381 cash on hand at the end of 2009, while Democratic primary candidate Janice Hahn, a Los Angeles City Council member, reported $341,341 cash on hand; neither has raised many big contributions since.

As a candidate who “is above politics” and a Governor who only assisted his own ballot initiatives, why would any candidate think he will finally decide to enter the “arena” and expend what little political clout he has banked?

rosa

Just a question, nothing to do with the topic. I got to this post via a link on Rough and Tumble, but nothing more recent than February 11 appears on the http://www.ibabuzz.com/politics/ main page, which I have bookmarked.

How did R&T get to this link? Is BANG having furlough Fridays… is that why the main page hasn’t been updated since Thursday?

(Okay, it was two questions!)

rosa

Hmmm. Just ignore me. The main page is updated now. (I’d already tried refreshing my browser over the past few days, but maybe I’m just a technology ditz!)